glasscandie

Just my two cents. I've been planning to apply for a fall 2010 entry for the whole time I've been an undergraduate, and recently decided to wait and apply for fall 2011 instead for personal reasons, but anyway - all the preparation I did was for fall 2010. I started off by obviously narrowing my schools, then looking at researchers I was interested in working with (behavioral neuroscience/pharmacology is my focus), and reading all the papers I could. I started contacting researchers in early 2009 - most of them were happy to talk with me, and returned my e-mails promptly. At least 4 of the researchers I e-mailed invited me down to see their labs and to discuss my interests further. I just recently met with one about 2 weeks ago. I think it's critical not just to get your name out there, but to make sure this researcher is really someone you'd want to work with. One of them had behavioral work listed on the Web site and in published papers, but when I got to the meeting his lab had changed focus to more molecular studies which isn't really my area of interest. One researcher told me he'd love to have me in his lab, but I'm just taking comments like that with a grain of salt lol Bring a list of questions, make sure you've read their literature. I brought my CV with me (and had e-mailed it to them as well, in my initial contact e-mail) so they could see the research I'd been involved in, etc.

I agree that mostly everything I'm learning in tutoring can be found in one of the practice books. However, my time is constrained - 3 year old daughter, one almost full-time internship (plus a recently accepted summer internship, which'll make 2), plus f/t school - it's nice having tips and tricks laid out for me and specific answers to questions as I come across them for problems. I'd do it again.

I'm taking a Princeton Review tutoring course, and I'm finding it to be helpful for me. I need to get my quant. up, so basically my classes are tailored to the quant. section, and I'm just memorizing words. There are some helpful tips that a tutoring class gave me on the verbal section that I hadn't been able to find in a book (e.g. what to do if you don't know any of the words, of if you only know 1 of the words, etc.). I've also been going to freerice.com. It's kind of addictive, and it's for a good cause - and a lot of the words that show up on that site I've found in my GRE books.

Actually, that is a thought, for him to do an earlier or later shift. I'm not really sure how it works for his job - he's military working in federal right now, but will be civilian (probably) working in contracting for at least a year, and then hopefully civilian in federal after that. All I know is right now he's on a ridiculous 4am-1pm shift, which is just impossibly awful lol

Ah, that sucks. I'm not too familiar with this area, I've only lived here for a few years and mainly stay north of DC. I'm from NJ originally. Well, I hate to cross a great school off my list, so I guess I'll see how it works out after this round of applications. Thanks for the input

I'm looking at the Virginia Commonwealth University at their behavioral pharmacology program, and I'm really excited about it. More than 4 researchers there do the type of research I'm interested in, and I have extensive lab. experience doing the types of studies they do (discrimination, novel object, etc.). However, right now I live in Maryland, between DC and Baltimore. If I were to stay in the DC/MD/VA area for school, my husband would be getting a job in DC or at the NSA in Maryland. Conversely, if I ended up getting accepted elsewhere (Emory, for example) we'd be moving there. I was looking at Fredericksburg, VA to move to if I got accepted at VCU. It's about an hour away from VCU, and an hour and a 1/2 away from the DC/MD area my husband would work in. There's really no jobs for him in VA, except maybe the FBI, but his skill set is very specialized, which is why he'd end up staying in DC. Is it feasible to make that type of commute daily to grad. school? Any experience here?

So the meeting went really well She unfortunately confirmed what I already knew - there's no graduate program at the behavioral biology lab. there. She did suggest American, which is high on my list - I've met with the one researcher there who does what I want to do, and work with 3 of his students at my current internship. It's just a matter of getting accepted lol She did suggest a researcher at the School of Medicine, but he takes more of a molecular approach than a behavioral approach. On a happier note, I suggested using a fairly new behavioral economics logarithm to analyze the results of one study I'm involved in and she was very supportive of that. I was nervous about suggesting it, but I know it would work well, and she apparently thinks that too! I also recently (today lol) got asked to help pilot a (small) study in the rat lab. (I'm already involved there, this is sort of an extension of one of the projects we're doing); and was offered the chance to write and first-author a paper on a study I've been solely doing the observations for! So that's exciting. Nothing to do with my meeting though lol

Oh great, now I'm thinking the mid-700's would be less than stellar. lol I think the average GRE quant. score for most of the schools I'm applying to is around the mid-700's. U MD College Park is between 700-760, American U's BCAN program is about 700, too. I'm applying to behavioral neuropharmacology programs, so I assume the GRE quant. is going to be weighted more than the verbal, unfortunately; but I'm directly interning in the exact field at the moment, and we've never used any of the math that's on the GRE. What we do use from algebra is logs, but mostly it's statistical work which I'm fine with. Hm. I'm still undecided whether I should re-take the class or not. I don't want it to affect a funding decision.

Thanks for the quick response I'm estimating somewhere in the high 600's/low 700's for quant. unless something magical happens that throws me in the high 700's lol (based on my tutoring and the ETS practice scores I've gotten). I'm applying to behavioral neuropharmacology programs...so I'm assuming they'll look at quant. more than verbal (I got a 670 on verbal w/out studying, so I'm not worried there - my scores have always been lopsided in favor of verbal). I'm taking stats this semester (A so far, don't anticipate anything lower); and I'm taking a research methods class over the summer. I wasn't really planning on taking physics or calculus or anything, though. Would you take a higher level math, or would you re-take algebra? This C really annoys the heck out of me, it was the first semester I got lower than an A - there's just a giant drop in my scores for that one awful semester.

I ended up with a C in college algebra last semester (owch). It was basically a bad semester for me - I was juggling two internships, my daughter was sick (genetic disorder), I'm the editor for my school's psych. newsletter, and I just took too many classes. I didn't spend the time I should have on the course. However, I'm fairly confident I'll get a decent GRE quant. score (estimating by my GRE tutoring and my practice scores from ETS tests), and in my current semester (5 classes, including stats) I'm getting all A's. I'm debating re-taking it over the summer, because I know I can do better - I just didn't put the effort I should have in the class. But, I don't want to waste the $700 on the class if it won't really matter in the long run. I have research experience (2 internships, one at a leading research university), a publication, a great GPA (minus the stupid C), assume good GRE score, 2 senior theses (one under IRB review and one which will begin within the next few months), great recs, etc. I should mention I got a C in my astronomy class that semester, which is another example where I didn't put my efforts - in my defense, that teacher was teaching a 100 level class like it was a 400 level class. Anyway. If you were in my situation, would you re-take it? Or would you let the subsequent great grades coupled with a brief explanation (or no explanation) about the situation speak for itself? I need to make a decision, b/c I'm taking summer classes regardless, and it would be one of the classes I'd need to sign up for...

Wish me luck, I have a meeting on Tuesday with the head of the department that I was so intimidated by

Damn, I just paid a bunch of money for a tutor at Princeton Review. Well, I suppose I could supplement with Kaplan's stuff...I would be doing outside studying anyway. Shoot.

I would really love to go to Hopkins (wouldn't anyone? lol). I'm going to have to do some further research into the researchers in the psych. department. At first glance, most of them don't seem to be doing anything with neuropharmacology - mainly communication and aggression studies. The School of Medicine does have some, but they seem less focused on the behavioral. I suppose it couldn't hurt to e-mail and see if they would consider branching out in their lab. One of my supervisors there suggested talking to the head of the behavioral biology department, but she is SO intimidating to me - she knows everyone, she's like the queen of the BB center. lol. I've been in a few collaboration meetings with her, but that's about it. Thanks for your advice! I'm definitely going to look up Amherst. I wish I could find more than only 2 or 3 in the Maryland area, I'd really like to stick around here!

AU is definitely at the top of my list - I work with a lot of the AU researcher's students at Hopkins (doing an internship in their behavioral biology lab) and it's exactly what I want to do. I'll have to check out UMass, thanks! I was looking at UMass Boston and Boston U, but ultimately cut them from my list b/c it wasn't exactly where my research interests were headed. I'm disappointed - there was a researcher at Hopkins who does exactly what I want to do, but his research has turned more towards people than in a drug lab which was disappointing. The most frustrating thing is the behavioral biology lab. at Hopkins doesn't have a graduate program out of it - it's loosely connected with the School of Medicine, and there is a PhD program in behavioral neuroscience at the SOM, but none of the researchers work out of the lab. I'm interning at. I'm trying to find a researcher who would be willing to do a joint project, I've already been told at the lab. that they'd be willing to work with me in grad. school by two different researchers - just have to find the right avenue! I know AU would be one of those avenues. I know at least one of the grad. students at AU tried to the same thing I'm trying (researcher at SOM + working at behavioral biology) but it didn't work out.

A little bit, yes, and all of the labs I'm interested in are drug labs - my interests are mainly in behavioral studies, such as discrimination or taste aversion, though. For example, the main drug I've been researching, and would probably want to continue research for graduate school, is MDMA (e.g. is it reinforcing?) but a lot of it is also looking at seroternergic neurotoxicity and 5-HT. What schools would you suggest?